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Monday, January 16, 2006

Between Alaska and Austin: A Behemoth Retrospective

Well, after coming up with that pretentious title, I must admit that the forthcoming "behemoth" update will probably be shorter than most of Rebecca's "regular" posts. (In college, guess whose papers were always too short and whose were always too long? Just to give you a sense of what we're working with here, it's taken me 15 minutes to write this far. I'm in for a long night...)

So I spent thirteen unfortunate and vaguely airsick hours in transit between the 49th state and the 6th state. I had to pay $50.00 (also known as HALF MY WEEKLY STIPEND... someone should invent Intern Airlines, where in lieu of payment they make you do data entry and bring the pilot his coffee) in weight fees for my horrifically heavy, way-the-hell-over-50-pounds-each luggage. I blame it on Richard, who assured me that if I looked pathetic and endearing enough, they wouldn't charge me. Clearly my endearing leaves much to be desired. At least the 60-pound suitcase made the 52-pound one look great by comparison, so I only had to pay for that one. Unlike my last cross-country airplane trip, wherein I decided for no particular reason that Denver was NOT an hour ahead of Seattle, this one involved no missed connections (self-inflicted or otherwise...), and only a couple of minor delays. And crossing four time zones definitely took the edge out of going to bed at 3:30 in the morning.

I spent lovely quiet holidays at home, with a brief foray to New York at the end of December; Jenna and I made a whirlwind tour of Manhattan (train from Fairfield, bagels and cream cheese, Lower East Side Tenement Museum, sushi with Bradford, Amy from Ono's welcome-back-to-the-U.S. party, "A Christmas Carol" complete with boy vomiting in the row behind us, Penn Station, done and done) and then I joined my mom and bro at my grandparents' for another lovely couple of days. (Click here before February 5th to grow instantly jealous of the fabulous Red Grooms exhibit we got to see.) At the end of December I had lunch with R. from high school who's now the receptionist for Sierra Club on Capitol Hill (oooooh). I rang in 2006 at the short house in Greenfield with much gorging and game-playing, and then for the second year in a row I did a special January 1st yoga class (108 Sun Salutations for an auspicious new year, not to mention the much-anticipated guarantee of agonizingly sore hamstrings for at least a week afterwards... how could I resist?). And then it was the last night of Chanukah, 2006 had begun, and visiting season - in which our heroine attempts to see everyone she wants to see in a span of under three weeks - was underway.

Visiting Season In Brief: I kicked off visiting season that Monday by taking the bus out to Boston to visit B&A&A in their giantest apartment ever. As befits a visit with one's oldest friends, we scraped together a dinner, caught up on thirteen months of gossip, perused old yearbooks, and lolled around in the living room for hours and hours and hours. An altogether satisfactory venture. Wednesday I visited Signature Sounds, lunched with Kate P., and met Richard at the airport when he flew in from Seattle. Thursday Lauren arrived, and Friday involved a much-needed visit to the eye doctor (my first since 10th grade! who knew new glasses could actually help me see properly?!) and an equally essential visit to Turn It Up to get in our used-music fix. Saturday we went sledding and saw "Brokeback Mountain" and on Sunday Lauren left and I dropped off Richard at his brother and sister-in-law's in Providence after dining with them. (Why you should have a brother and sister-in-law who are both doctors, or at least befriend someone who has a brother and sister-in-law who are both doctors: Because they buy you seafood dinners and give you their car with only 73,000 miles on it when they buy a new Mercedes.) The following Wednesday, after Richard got back from Providence, we did a day trip down to Connecticut to visit all our adopted moms at the CRC; the next day I visited Alexandra and Carl and my three favorite half-French half-pints. Friday the 13th we held a faux birthday celebration for my mother, since we're leaving before her actual birthday, which brings me to dinner and games night at Matt & Rosie's after the Brattleboro sing yesterday. We played Richard's brilliant board game, Sing Off! (a shapenote-themed version of this game, which you may recall from such stories as how I became obsessed with it at Sandy's parents' house in June) and ate Indian food and laughed until we hurt. Then Richard and I drove J&L back to their house and we polished off the night with a few rounds of Sacred Harp Guess Who. Today was tea with Chelsea, which was fabulous, and then more tea at Molly & David's. You may think that, since we are after all leaving on Wednesday and I still have yet to pack, visiting season is over - but nay! Tomorrow is breakfast with Suuuuuuuuue. Plus one last stop at Andrea's, if we can coordinate it, to hear how Vegas was. And then, by god, I will pack if it kills me, and on Wednesday we are OUTTA here. Yikes.

So I think I've name-checked most everyone I've had a wonderful time with since I've been back. Just imagine all my spare time filled with working for Peri, going to the Tuesday night sings, and seeing "King Kong," and you'll have a disturbingly accurate picture of how I spent every conceivable minute during my month back east. After reading the above four paragraphs, you'll also have a disturbingly accurate picture of how I spent the past two hours. Is it normal to generate sentences at a rate of one every five minutes? Somehow I doubt it.

I promise I'll start posting more regularly once Richard and I get on the road. Probably. And hey, I think this may have ended up being a Rebecca-length post!

4 comments:

WAAAAAAHH! Tonight is the last night singing with K. Stupid Texas is a stupid state for stupid people. Why are you going? Why? Plus, it's hot. Really hot, and for most of the year. And don't talk to me about dry heat, please. I may dry heave. heheh. See, that was a little play on words there. Check me out keeping my sense of humor in times of DEEP DISTRESS.

Er, safe travel. God be with you 'til we meet again, etc., blah blah blah, and so on.

p.s. It took me two seconds to write this. I don't know what your problem is.

I would also like to point out, in my defense, that my entries lately have not exactly been of gargantuan proportion, and are occurring less and less frequently. Which all points to the disturbing conclusion that, rather than getting less rambly in my old age, I may actually have a life! Thanks katie for picking up the blog slack... I promise pictures later this week...

K and R... safe travels, enjoy your roadtripping without me! To ensure that your trip together is just as exciting as those I have taken with you separately:1) Katie - ask richard to count for several hours. 2) richard - just put the radio on nonstop country (preferably switching over to southern gospel as all possible opportunities) and ask katie to point out every cow you pass.

ps I may have well as posted with all this commenting. pps It took me about 5 minutes.